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On the decrease in subject-verb inversion in French declaratives

  • Georg Kaiser and Michael Zimmermann
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The Development of Grammar
This chapter is in the book The Development of Grammar

Abstract

This paper discusses the evolution of subject-verb inversion in declarative root clauses in French. The frequent occurrence of such constructions in Medieval French is generally accounted for in terms of a V2 analysis, and their marginality in Modern French is attributed to the loss of V2. Given clear evidence against the assumed V2 status of Medieval French, subject-verb inversion is alternatively explained in terms of a differentiation of subject-verb inversions (‘true’ subject-verb inversion vs. ‘NP-inversion’) as well as in terms of the existence of a ‘Focus Criterion’. It is claimed that while in (non-colloquial) Modern French, NP-inversion still exists, the highly limited instances of true subject-verb inversion constitute learnt vestiges. The loss of true subject-verb inversion is attributed to a parametric resetting of the Spell-Out condition associated with the ‘Focus Criterion’.

Abstract

This paper discusses the evolution of subject-verb inversion in declarative root clauses in French. The frequent occurrence of such constructions in Medieval French is generally accounted for in terms of a V2 analysis, and their marginality in Modern French is attributed to the loss of V2. Given clear evidence against the assumed V2 status of Medieval French, subject-verb inversion is alternatively explained in terms of a differentiation of subject-verb inversions (‘true’ subject-verb inversion vs. ‘NP-inversion’) as well as in terms of the existence of a ‘Focus Criterion’. It is claimed that while in (non-colloquial) Modern French, NP-inversion still exists, the highly limited instances of true subject-verb inversion constitute learnt vestiges. The loss of true subject-verb inversion is attributed to a parametric resetting of the Spell-Out condition associated with the ‘Focus Criterion’.

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents vii
  3. Introduction 1
  4. Part I. (2)L1 versus L2 versus child L2
  5. ‘Acquisition’ in grammatical development 19
  6. Tense and Aspect in early French development in aL2, 2L1 and cL2 learners 47
  7. Subject clitics in child L2 acquisition of French 75
  8. Placement of infinitives in successive child language acquisition 105
  9. Part II. The acquisition of sentence structure and functional categories
  10. The developmental pathway of nominal functional categories in early child Mandarin 125
  11. The emergence of CP in child Basque 151
  12. Some directions for the systematic investigation of the acquisition of Cypriot Greek 179
  13. Strict Interfaces and three kinds of Multiple Grammar 205
  14. Part III. Autonomous development vs. crosslinguistic influence in bilingual first language acquisition
  15. Delay and acceleration in bilingual first language acquisition 231
  16. Intonation targets of yes/no questions by Spanish and German monolingual and bilingual children 263
  17. Perception of German vowels by bilingual Portuguese-German returnees 287
  18. Part IV. Language acquisition, language contact and diachronic change
  19. Acquisition in the context of language change 309
  20. On the diachronic reanalysis of null subjects and null objects in Brazilian Portuguese 331
  21. On the decrease in subject-verb inversion in French declaratives 355
  22. On the relation between acceptability and frequency 383
  23. Name index 405
  24. Subject index 409
https://doi.org/10.1075/hsm.11.19kai

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents vii
  3. Introduction 1
  4. Part I. (2)L1 versus L2 versus child L2
  5. ‘Acquisition’ in grammatical development 19
  6. Tense and Aspect in early French development in aL2, 2L1 and cL2 learners 47
  7. Subject clitics in child L2 acquisition of French 75
  8. Placement of infinitives in successive child language acquisition 105
  9. Part II. The acquisition of sentence structure and functional categories
  10. The developmental pathway of nominal functional categories in early child Mandarin 125
  11. The emergence of CP in child Basque 151
  12. Some directions for the systematic investigation of the acquisition of Cypriot Greek 179
  13. Strict Interfaces and three kinds of Multiple Grammar 205
  14. Part III. Autonomous development vs. crosslinguistic influence in bilingual first language acquisition
  15. Delay and acceleration in bilingual first language acquisition 231
  16. Intonation targets of yes/no questions by Spanish and German monolingual and bilingual children 263
  17. Perception of German vowels by bilingual Portuguese-German returnees 287
  18. Part IV. Language acquisition, language contact and diachronic change
  19. Acquisition in the context of language change 309
  20. On the diachronic reanalysis of null subjects and null objects in Brazilian Portuguese 331
  21. On the decrease in subject-verb inversion in French declaratives 355
  22. On the relation between acceptability and frequency 383
  23. Name index 405
  24. Subject index 409
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